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Saturday, March 30, 2013

More
than any other criticism of AHA I find this one to be the most serious. Namely,
I find AHA's existence and governance outside the authority of the Church to be
more than a little disturbing. The attitude in the author’s argument
demonstrates a seriously defective ecclesiology. Christ authorizes ministry
through His Church and only through His Church. Moreover, godly leaders
recognize the significance of formal structure and the importance of humble
submission to their spiritual leaders. They do not adopt the typical American
cowboy Christian idea that they are just going to go take care of business
themselves.

More
than any other criticism of AHA I find this one to be the most serious. Namely,
I find AHA's existence and governance outside the authority of the Church to be
more than a little disturbing. The attitude in the author’s argument
demonstrates a seriously defective ecclesiology. Christ authorizes ministry
through His Church and only through His Church. Moreover, godly leaders
recognize the significance of formal structure and the importance of humble
submission to their spiritual leaders. They do not adopt the typical American
cowboy Christian idea that they are just going to go take care of business
themselves.

Here I must agree with Ed. If a Christian layman sees a
toddler wander into a busy intersection, that hardly gives him an excuse to
take it upon himself to go rescue the child. That’s cowboy Christianity.

What makes you think you have the right to do the right
thing just because it’s staring you in the face? You need special permission to
do the right thing. We have standards, you know! Before you’re authorized to
rescue the child, you must fill out a 4404-QZ Intervention form, signed by your
pastor, and witnessed by an elder.

After the paperwork is complete, you can go back to the
intersection and peel the flattened toddler off the pavement.

Pope
Francis is getting kudos for footwashing. Never underestimate the power of an
empty gesture.

i) To my knowledge, footwashing is a standard feature of the
Maundy-Thursday Mass. Hence, this doesn’t say anything about the pope’s
humility. He does it, not because he’s humble, but because that’s a liturgical
requirement (i.e. the pedilavium). It would be surprising if he refrained from doing it.

ii) Footwashing is hardly confined to the church of Rome.
Several Protestant denominations observe footwashing on Maundy-Thursday.

In addition, some Protestant denominations practice
footwashing on a regular basis. Not just once a year.

iii) However, some commentators praise Francis for washing
the feet of prisoners and AIDS patients. Well, what about that?

iv) To begin with, washing their feet while the cameras are
rolling doesn’t strike me as an exercise in humility. That’s calling attention
to yourself.

Ironically, it’s quite possible to pridefully perform a rite
that signifies humility. Spiritual showmanship. Doing it to prove to others
what a humble guy you are.

v) In addition, why can’t AIDS patients wash their own feet?
Is it because they are too weakened by the ravages of AIDS to care for
themselves? But if that’s the case, then an annual, ritual ablution hardly
meets their needs. Shouldn’t we be praising the hospice orderlies who care for
them on a daily basis?

vi) For that matter, why should a man in his mid-70s be
washing someone else’s feet? If push comes to shove, shouldn’t the younger
generation wash his feet? People his age often suffer from arthritis. It isn’t
easy for some of them to wash their feet or clip their toenails.

vii) Someone might object that I’m missing the point. The
point of footwashing is the symbolism, and not because people need other people
to wash their feet. Well, what about that?

For starters, does footwashing pack the same symbolic punch
in a culture where most folks wear socks and shoes, bathe or shower once or
twice daily? Where many women have pedicures and painted toenails?

Perhaps the closest analogy to 1C footwashing would be
washing the feet of a street person or diabetic with foot disease.

viii)Moreover, if we’re really serious about the symbolism,
shouldn’t we consider cross-cultural equivalents?

ix) Is Jesus only concerned with symbolism? Not only did he
wash the feet of the disciples, but he died for them.

What about orderlies in hospitals and nursing homes. Or
janitors? Or mothers caring for their babies? Or an elderly husband or wife who cares for his failing spouse? Isn’t that closer to the spirit
of footwashing?

The
argument for “marriage quality” takes heterosexual pairing as the paradigm. But
are they comparable? Do they really love each other?

From what I’ve read, homosexual men don’t appear to bond
psychologically with one another the way men and women bond psychologically.
Rather, homosexual men always seem to be on the lookout for fresh meant. Young
new bodies to sodomize.

In addition, homosexual men don’t appear to bond emotionally
with other men the way heterosexual men bond emotionally with other men (e.g.
normal male friendship).

Some homosexual men have lifelong “partners,” but that seems
to be platonic, even if it started out sexually. And that’s set apart from a
steady stream of homosexual trysts and one-night stands with other men.

The closest analogy to the homosexual man is the womanizer.
A heterosexual man who goes from one woman to the next. Yet even womanizers can
become deeply or uniquely attached to a particular woman. A woman who’s the
love of their life. But they lack impulse control. The womanizer suffers from
some deep-seated insecurity or void which he’s always trying to fill. Rather
like an alcoholic who’s dulling the pain or emptiness.

As for lesbians, that seems to be a sexual relationship that’s
grafted onto female friendship. Since they reject men, then sex with women is
their only fallback.

Liberals
contend that the Gospels are historically unreliable because they were written
so long after the events. Of course, that’s a circular argument inasmuch as it
presumes the liberal dating (and authorship) of the Gospels.

But it also overlooks the fact that older folks frequently
remember earlier events more clearly and distinctly than later events. Here’s
an interesting anecdote from Warnie Lewis, fourteen months after the death of
his famous brother:

Oddly enough as time goes on the vision of J as he was in
his later years grows fainter, that of him in earlier days more and more vivid.
It is the J of the attic and the little end room, the J of Daudelspiels and the
walks and jaunts, the J of the early and middle years whom I miss so cruelly.
An absurd feeling, for even had he lived that Jack had already died. Perhaps it
has been sharpened by the fact that I am reliving something of the middle years
by going through our old walking tours in my diaries, and I can see him almost
as if he was visible, on a path in front of me, striding along with a stick and
a pack in his shapeless old fisherman’s hat…Not that I idealize those days for they
too had their hard times; but then they were bad times shared with J and that
made all the difference.

Now that
we know that June Freud (née June Flewett) was the inspiration for Lucy in The
Chronicles of Narnia, it’s interesting to go back and read about the impression
that she made on Warnie Lewis (C. S. Lewis’s brother). It’s like walking back
out of the wardrobe into the real world:

Tuesday
2nd January, 1945

Our dear,
delightful June Flewett leaves us tomorrow, after nearly two years…She is not
yet eighteen, but I have met no one of any age further advanced in the
Christian way of life From seven in the morning till nine at night, shut off
from people of her own age, almost grudged the time for her religious duties,
she has slaved at The Kilns, for a fraction 2d. an hour; I have never seen her
other than gay, eager to anticipate exigent demands, never complaining, always
self-accusing in the frequent crises of that dreary house. Her reaction to the
meanest ingratitude was to seek its cause in her own faults. She is one of
those rare people to whom one can venture to apply the word “saintly.”

There's been a lot of talk lately about the high percentage of young people who support homosexual marriage. Think of how that percentage reflects on their parents, among other influences in their lives. Part of the reason why academia, the media, Hollywood, the music industry, and other sources have had so much influence on how young people view homosexuality is that parents and other alternative sources have had so little influence. How many men have been spending hours watching basketball this month, but haven't had a single discussion with their children about theological, political, ethical, or other more important issues, like homosexuality? How many fathers have never had such a discussion with their children about any such issue or have only done so rarely? We often hear about how important it is that parents spend time with their children. Fathers should attend a child's school play or take their son to a football game, for example. Or teach him how to cut the grass, how to shave, etc. Why is there so much emphasis placed on that sort of thing, but so little emphasis placed on the need for men to exercise intellectual leadership? Are you teaching your children not only what they should believe, but also why they should believe it, how to research an issue, how to respond to objections, how to interact with opposing positions, etc.? Are you setting aside time at the dinner table, during car rides, or in other contexts to do such things? If you don't shape the intellectual life of your children, who will?

Much the same can be said of how pastors influence congregations, how teachers influence students, etc. In other contexts, like with coworkers and friends, we have less of an opportunity to influence people, since we're not in a position of authority over them. Still, we have some influence. Whatever your context, are you making much of your opportunities to influence the people around you? Have you used the recent news stories about homosexual marriage to discuss homosexuality or this Easter season to discuss the evidence for Jesus' resurrection, for example? How many of these opportunities do you let pass by? Would we be seeing what we've seen with the cultural shift on homosexuality (as one example among many) if there wasn't widespread neglect in this area? Parents are the most guilty group of all, but there's a lot of blame to go around. Maybe you should be spending less time with basketball, television, and housework and more time doing other things.

Friday, March 29, 2013

"Alisa LaPolt Snow, the lobbyist representing the Florida Alliance of Planned Parenthood Affiliates, testified that her organization believes the decision to kill an infant who survives a failed abortion should be left up to the woman seeking an abortion and her abortion doctor."

This is the FIRST time ever that Planned Parenthood has come out and supported this—and without any shame.

This is their head lobbyist giving their official position. These people are monsters.

I’m not
a C. S. Lewis scholar. And I’m not a blind devotee of Lewis. However, I think
it’s wrong to libel the dead.

I’m struck by the confidence with which some writers assume
that Lewis had an affair with Janie Moore. I could certainly be mistaken, but I
don’t find that very plausible.

To begin with, suppose he did. Since Lewis was an atheist
back then, there’d be nothing shocking or scandalous about his indulging in
premarital sex. No one expects a young unattached male atheist to be celibate.

That said:

i) It isn’t normal for a teenage boy to have an affair with
the middle-aged mother of a friend.

ii) Moreover, why assume Lewis was so desperate that he had
to settle for her? He was an eligible young bachelor. A student at Oxford.
Surely there were available pretty single girls his own age.

Most of us have seen pictures of Lewis when he was baggy,
balding middle-aged duffer, but as a young man he cut a sharper profile.

So I can’t think of any compelling reason why an eligible
young bachelor would settle for the mother when he surely had more appealing
options to choose from.

iii) I don’t think it was at all unusual back then for young
bachelors to have older housekeepers.

iv) Lewis lived with his brother Warnie. So should we also
assume that Warnie had an affair with Moore?

v) Although Lewis, as a young atheist, would have no moral
compunctions about premarital sex, even he would realize that banging on the
mother of your late best friend, who entrusted her to your care in case he died
in action, would be reprehensible. Deeply dishonorable. A betrayal of the first
magnitude.

vi) It’s also possible that Moore was a substitute mother
figure, after Lewis lost his own mother at the age of 9.

vii) Seems more plausible to me that he was simply honoring
the pledge he made with his wartime comrade that if one died, the survivor
would care for the decedent’s parent.

viii) Perhaps some people think that’s just a cover story.
But is there any reason to think comrades in the trenches wouldn’t make a pact
like that? WWI had horrendous casualties. Seems likely to me that many comrades
said to each other, “If I die, look after my mother (father, brother), but if
you die, I’ll look after yours.” Surely those conversations weren’t unusual in
the infantry.

“So the man named all the animals, the birds of the air, and the living creatures of the field, but for Adam no companion who corresponded to him was found. So the LORD God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep, and while he was asleep, he took part of the man’s side and closed up the place with flesh. Then the LORD God made a woman from the part he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. Then the man said, “This one at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; this one will be called ‘woman,’ for she was taken out of man.” That is why a man leaves his father and mother and unites with his wife, and they become a new family.” (Gen 2:20–24 NET)

The Shroud of Turin has been in the news a lot lately, due to a new book that's come out claiming further scientific testing that dates the Shroud around the time of Jesus. See the March 28 entry here for an overview from Barrie Schwortz, including a discussion of some of the problems with Giulio Fanti's claims at this point. We'll have to wait to see how things develop. Dan Porter has been covering the story on his blog as well. There's already good reason to reject the 1988 carbon dating of the Shroud, such as Ray Rogers' work published in 2005. We'll see how much Fanti's research adds to that. From what I've read so far, I agree with the general thrust of Schwortz's comments. Fanti's work looks somewhat promising, but there are problems with it.

Ted
Olson argued (or asserted) before the Supreme Court that marriage is a “fundamental
right.” From that premise, he reasoned that homosexuals are being denied that “fundamental
right.”

But even
if we agree with that characterization, the argument is equivocal in more than
one respect.

Even if
marriage is a fundamental right, that doesn’t make it a Constitutional right.
Not all human rights or civil rights are enshrined in the Constitution. The
Constitution is a very limited document, and deliberately so. It’s a non sequitur
to infer that if marriage is a fundamental right, then it must be a
Constitutional right.

The
Constitution is silent on many social issues. There’s a reason why we have
Congress, as well as state legislatures.

One of the important matters I wanted to address with my
series on Ezekiel’s temple is that of hermeneutics and their application in the
interpretation of prophetic passages like Ezekiel 40-48.I certainly acknowledge there are
difficulties for my literal take on those chapters. However, there are also
some profound difficulties for Reformed covenant folks who utilize a
non-literal, more spiritualized view of the Ezekiel’s temple.

Because
my literal hermeneutics place my theology in a position of criticism in what I
would consider important matters of atonement, Christ’s cross work, and human
salvation, I think it is necessary to demonstrate internal, theological and
orthodox consistency with my literalism.

I don’t think that’s the correct way to frame the issue.
Amil interpreters (at least the astute, scholarly proponents) employ a
consistent hermeneutic. They use the grammatico-historical method. They don’t
shift hermeneutical gears when they come to Ezk 40-48.

For a comparison, take the Gospel of Matthew. A conservative
evangelical scholar will interpret most of the Gospel factually, yet he will
interpret the parables fictionally. However, interpreting the parables
differently than the surrounding historical narrative doesn’t mean he suddenly
flipped the switch to a different hermeneutic when he comes to the parables.
He’s using the same hermeneutical principles throughout. And those principles
make allowance for different literary genres.

Likewise, if he understands Mt 2:15 typologically, that’s
consistent with his hermeneutical package.

I can't and don't vouch for everything on NARTH, but the website might be worth perusing:

NARTH is a professional, scientific organization that offers hope to those who struggle with unwanted homosexuality. As an organization, we disseminate educational information, conduct and collect scientific research, promote effective therapeutic treatment, and provide referrals to those who seek our assistance.

NARTH upholds the rights of individuals with unwanted homosexual attraction to receive effective psychological care and the right of professionals to offer that care. We welcome the participation of all individuals who will join us in the pursuit of these goals.

The evidence for the resurrection is often framed in terms of the testimony of the resurrection witnesses and the empty tomb, as if any hypothesis about what happened only has to address those two lines of evidence. Sometimes the empty tomb isn't even included. We should keep in mind that there's a lot more involved, though. The New Testament documents often refer to the resurrection as a fulfillment of prophecy and refer to how the apostles were empowered to perform miracles by the risen Christ, for example. Then there's extra-Biblical evidence, like the Shroud of Turin. Jesus' resurrection not only is a good explanation of the testimony of the resurrection witnesses and the empty tomb, but also is a good explanation of Paul's acquisition of the ability to perform miracles, the image on the Shroud of Turin, and other evidence that isn't mentioned as often. The same skeptic who has to find a way to dismiss the testimony of resurrection witnesses like Peter and Paul and dismiss the empty tomb also has to find a way to dismiss the other lines of evidence. There are more than two lines to account for here. I believe most people who follow these issues closely are aware of that fact, but it's not acknowledged enough, and we need to keep it more at the forefront of our thinking. The resurrection evidence is broader and deeper than we often make it out to be. There's merit to taking something like a minimal facts approach toward the resurrection in some contexts. That approach can be taken too far, though, and can leave people with a false impression about how much evidence we have for the resurrection.

It's often said that people are more likely to support homosexual marriage, or the homosexual movement in general, if they know somebody who's homosexual and realize it. It's true that how you view homosexuality is largely a matter of who you know. It's not surprising if a nation deeply in love with sexual sin, and looking to ease its conscience by approving of other people who behave similarly (Romans 1:32), would keep broadening its definition of which sexual behavior is acceptable. We don't have much self-control. That's why we as a nation are more than sixteen trillion dollars in debt, have acquired more than 110,000,000 sexually transmitted infections, and have had tens of millions of abortions in recent decades, for example. Yes, it's largely a matter of who you know.

Wednesday, March 27, 2013

(Reuters) - Today, in a packed courtroom, Carrie White and
Liz Sherman were acquitted on charges of murder by arson.

Carrie was charged with incinerating her classmates on prom
night, while her codefendant, Liz Sherman, was charged with incinerating staff and
patients at the asylum where she was staying.

Lead defense attorney Robert Shapiro used the celebrated “Carrier”
defense to get his clients acquitted. In a famous debate with David Marshall,
Carrier denied that Jesus ever miraculously healed anyone. Carrier insisted
that all his cures were “psychosomatic.”

Apparently, that was sufficient to convince the jury,
although some veteran courtroom reporters privately speculated that jurors
were afraid of what Hellboy might to do them if they convicted his girlfriend.

I
think this is worth considering, especially the parts about all the
damage that heterosexuals have done to the institution of marriage. And
if you really want to know where THAT damage began, take a look at John
Milton's, THE DOCTRINE AND DISCIPLINE OF DIVORCE, written in 1643 (at
the very time the Westminster Assembly was meeting).

Talbot LoganTo
reduce the legal issue to "access to basic rights" I think it not an
accurate nor fair summation. There are currently in excess of 1000
Federal benefits that are denied to same sex couples including Social
Security survivor benefits, the right to inherit from a spouse, mandated
family medical leave, partner immigration protection, tax on health
benefits etc. Federal benefits are even more important for military
personnel and government employees whose same-sex spouses are not
accorded the same benefits. That is why this is an important issue.

Talbot LoganThere
is not a call to ask any religious institution to change their views or
their definitions of their tenets. But unfortunately, the government
has already redefined marriage by offering specific protections under
the law and it is that "meaning" that needs to change. And as a gay
may, I deny the author's denial that "changing the meaning of the word
will improve the acceptance of gays in society". Many social injustices
have been corrected by taking words and phrases that have been
exclusionary and even hateful and redefining and/or eliminating. I deny
that the author, since he is not a gay man, can even understand that
what I don't want is access to basic social “rights.” I want to be
treated with the same dignity and respect and protection as every
American. That I believe is a God-given and inalienable right and
supports the greatest commandment of "love thy neighbor as thyself".
Far from "basic".

Sam LoganVery
good clarifications, my son. THANK YOU! I agree with you that what
our government has done is "unfortunate." I agree that this needs to
change and I support that change in every way that I can. I agree that,
no matter what they think about gay marriage, evangelical Christians
(starting with your father) need to be much more agressive and creative
in "loving ALL of our neighbors" as ourselves. We/I have done a
terrible job at that, not just with respect to gays but also with
respect to the poor, to those of different races, AND to those of
different religions (including Muslims, who probably are more
discriminated against in our society than any other single group). And,
as you will have note in my comments about this piece, I think its
strongest point is what it says about how the greatest damage to the
institution of marriage has been done by heterosexuals. So THANK YOU
for your corrections and clarifications!

*****************************************

As a friend of mine pointed out:

Interestingly enough, James Taranto at the Wall Street
Journal already rebutted this claim back on January 16th, by citing a
correspondent:

You quoted Lisa Arnold and Christina Campbell as complaining
that "more than 1,000 laws provide overt legal or financial benefits to
married couples."

This is a false statement that has propagated through many
news reports and opinion pieces. I can't be certain where Arnold and Campbell
got it, but I'll bet it is based on a misreading of this report and its
antecedents, widely and inaccurately referenced in Defense of Marriage Act
arguments.

This document merely lists 1,138 "federal laws in which
marital status is a factor." It includes entries for which marriage
confers neither benefit or penalty, many in which marriage is penalized, and
very few in which married couples get benefits. Here's a sample of entries in
the document:

• Mail-order bride business (Category 6, Title 8, Part IX, §
1375)

• Eligibility under first-time home-buyer programs (two
singles get $16,000 but a married couple gets $8000)

• Gold Star Wives of America

• Membership of Martin Luther King, Jr., Federal Holiday
Commission

The fact is that taxes make marriage extremely expensive for
almost all successful opposite-sex couples, more so if they have children, even
more so under the new Obama tax rates. Income tax liability is generally lower
(not higher, as Arnold and Campbell assert) for unmarried earners, and lower
still for single parents than married parents.

The only notable exception to the marriage penalty is for
same-sex married couples in community property states, who (thanks to DOMA)
divide their income 50/50 and file single or single head-of-household
returns--which always saves them a bundle compared to any other tax status.

>>>

Taranto comments: "Some of those gays may be in for an
unpleasant surprise if the Supreme Court strikes down DOMA."

i) A basic problem with Carrier’s argument is that he fails
to distinguish between the internal argument from evil and the external
argument from evil.

The existence of infant mortality isn’t even prima facie
inconsistent with the existence of the Biblical God. It’s not as if the Bible
depicts a world in which no child ever dies of illness, in glaring contrast to
the real world where children die every day.

Death is a fixture of Bible history. In Scripture, everyone
dies–sooner or later. Likewise, the Bible acknowledges the existence of
disease. Indeed, Carrier appeals to the healings of Jesus to document that
fact.

The Bible doesn’t depict a disease-free world. The Bible
doesn’t depict a world in which everyone is immortal.

Therefore, there is no prima facie discrepancy between
Biblical theism and human mortality. So why does Carrier think human mortality
is an undercutter or defeater for Biblical theism? From a Biblical perspective,
the coexistence of the Biblical God with human mortality is clearly compatible,
for the obvious reason that Scripture acknowledges both.

It’s as if Carrier deployed the argument from water to
disprove Biblical theism. Carrier cited statistics regarding the volume of
freshwater in lakes, rivers, glaciers, icecaps, and aquifers. He cited
statistics about snowfall and rainfall. He cited statistics about the volume of
saltwater in the oceans.

He then triumphantly explained how the existence of water
disproved the existence of Yahweh! But since the Bible doesn’t deny the
existence of water, how would the existence of water be inconsistent with the
existence of Yahweh?

ii) The Bible has a theology of death. There is a
theological rationale for death. Carrier doesn’t even engage that argument.

Human mortality a divine curse. We live in a fallen world.
Exposure to natural evils like disease and death are hallmarks of our fallen
condition.

iii) Although death is a curse, death has fringe benefits.
Many of us exist because others have died. Take replacement children. Or widows
and widowers who remarry. Take war, which results in dislocation. That, in
turn, results in men and women mating with different men and women than if they
hadn’t migrated from the war zone. Same thing with famine. A fallen world has compensatory goods.

iv) Although death is a curse, immortality in a fallen world
would be a curse. To live in sin century after century, millennium after
millennium, to be trapped in a fallen world, to be unable to die, is no less
punitive than death. Indeed, that’s what the Bible means by everlasting
punishment.

Many unbelievers begin killing themselves long before their
natural lifespan has run its course. Many unbelievers begin killing themselves
in their prime. They drink themselves to death. Or escape into recreational drugs. Or commit
suicide.

They can’t stand to be sober. They hate getting up in the
morning. They dread the prospect of getting through another day. They are
miserable, depressed. The emptiness of their godless existence is unendurable.

v) Death is the great reminder of how life without God robs
us of everything we hold dear. In a fallen world, time is often our worst
enemy. The thief of time. The passage of time devours our past. Steadily
consumes everything that makes life worthwhile.

Coming face to face with the death of friends and relatives
forces us to confront our desperate need for divine healing. Physical healing.
Spiritual healing. Emotional healing.

vi) The Bible has a doctrine of immortality. That’s an
eschatological promise. Although death is the Last Enemy, death won’t have the
last word.

Having to wait for something makes it more precious than
instant gratification. Dying makes eternal life more precious. Frequently we
don’t know how good we had it until we lose it.

As an internal argument from evil, Carrier’s argument
fails–badly.

vii) What about an external argument from evil? But from
that perspective, why is infant mortality evil?

To begin with, Carrier supports abortion. So he’s shedding
crocodile tears when he feigns indignation over the death of babies.

viii) In addition, from his Darwinian perspective, high
rates of mortality for young offspring figure in the balance of nature. That’s
a common phenomenon in the animal kingdom. Out of large litters, only a few
survive to adulthood. Most offspring die to feed predators, scavengers, and
detritivores. Carrier complains about germs and parasites, but that’s an
integral part of the ecosystem. Has Carrier bothered to consider what would
happen to life on earth if we eradicated all germs and parasites? Has it
occurred to him that that would be detrimental to life on earth?

From a Darwinian perspective, the death of simian primate
offspring is no different than the death of prosimian primate offspring (e.g.
gibbons, lemurs, orangutan, marmosets). Of course, because it’s our own
species, natural selection has programmed our brain to form emotional
attachments for certain members of our own species, like offspring. But that
has no objective significance.

ix) Carrier makes hay about Christ’s opposition to
ceremonial handwashing. Is Carrier really that illiterate, or is he just
playing to the galleries?

In context, this has reference to ritual cleansing, not
hygienic cleansing. Ritual ablutions don’t use antiseptic soap and water.
There’s nothing inherently sanitary about ritual ablutions.

x) Carrier said:

No. Jesus argued that we don't have to wash our hands before
we eat, that washing is a human tradition, with no endorsement from God. And
that nothing we put into us can harm us. And as he is claimed to have said in
the Gospel of Mark, not even poison. Clearly, Jesus knew nothing about germs.
Nor did he know that faith doesn't make you immune to poison, either.

a) Carrier is partly alluding to the Long Ending of Mark.
But that’s probably a scribal interpolation.

b) In addition, Carrier is alluding to Mk 7:14-23 (par. Mt
15:10-20). Once again, is Carrier really that illiterate, or is he just playing
to the galleries?

Jesus is discussing “defilement,” not hygiene. “Defilement”
is a cultic category. It refers to ritual impurity, not unsanitary conditions.

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

13 Now
when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples,
“Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” 14 And they said, “Some say John
the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” 15
He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” 16 Simon Peter replied, “You
are the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Mt 16:13-15).

Somewhere along the way, Michael Patton lost sight of a
simple, vital truth. Christians are called upon to put their faith in the Jesus
of the Gospels, not the Jesus of the scholars. In the Jesus of the Evangelists,
not the Jesus of the apologists.

That’s how Christ chose to make himself known to posterity.
These are the authorized biographies.

We are required to put our faith in the canonical Jesus of
St. Matthew, not the reconstructed Jesus of Matthew Brook O’Donnell; in the
canonical Jesus of St. Mark, not the reconstructed Jesus of Marcus Bockmuehl;
in the canonical Jesus of St. Luke, not the reconstructed Jesus of Luke Timothy
Johnson; in the canonical Jesus of St. John, not the reconstructed Jesus of
John Meier.

Jesus is not a scholarly construct. If that’s the only Jesus
you trust, your Jesus is an idol. The projection of a scholar’s redacted
imagination.

I appreciate the work of Christian scholars who defend the
historical Jesus. I appreciate the world of Christian apologists who defend the
Resurrection. If that’s an aid to faith, fine.

But God gave us the four Gospels. There’s where we encounter
Jesus.

The Gospels aren’t raw ore to sift for nuggets of the
historical Jesus. God didn’t give us the Gospels to take apart, edit, then
reassemble in some residual digest. That’s a substitute Jesus.

The Gospels are interpretive histories, and rightly so. Facts without context are deceptive.

I used to be a convinced Protestant. A contented Protestant. Then I was
overtaken by a fatal doubt.

One day, as I was reading through 1-2 Corinthians, a
terrifying question swept over me: What if I’m miscounting?

I mean, sure, they’re numbered in our editions of the NT.
But that’s an editorial addition. In the original Greek of 1 Corinthians &
2 Corinthians, it doesn’t say that Paul wrote two letters. Rather, you read one
letter by Paul to the Corinthians and another letter by Paul to the Corinthians.

Now, I kept counting and recounting. And every time I
counted 1 & 2 Corinthians, they always added up to two letters. I never got
three or four.

But then I remembered, as Bryan Cross is wont to say, that
for me to add them was making myself my own arithmetic authority.

Sure, Paul wrote one letter to the Corinthians, and another
letter to the Corinthians. Paul said he wrote each letter. But he never said he they were two letters.

How could I be infallibly certain that I hadn’t added wrong?
For me to infer or deduce that if Paul wrote one letter to the Corinthians, and
another letter to the Corinthians, he wrote two letters to the
Corinthians–that these were exactly two letters, rather than five–was quite a
leap of faith. A bridge too far. What if I’m a butterfly who dreamt that I
read 1-2 Corinthians?

I mean, sure, other Protestants have also done the math, but
what if they miscalculated?

It was only when I read the ex cathedra encyclical In unus
plus unus ("On one plus one") by Pope Numerus III that my heart was calmed.

I honestly don’t understand how Protestants can live with
the unbearable anxiety of having to number books of the Bible.

The
problem with many Evangelicals is that we can come dangerously close to
worshiping the Bible. As Evangelical theologian James Sawyer once said in jest,
we worship the Trinity: the Father, Son, and Holy Bible.

So, in
our best moments, we will condemn anything that smells of idolatry concerning
the Scriptures. We know that the Bible is not the fourth member of the Trinity.

I am
really saying nothing new or extraordinary here.

I agree
with Michael. He’s not saying anything new or extraordinary. Rather, he’s
recycling a stock rhetorical smear tactic which liberals use to slander
Bible-believing Christians. If you’re a Bible-believing Christian, liberals
accuse you of bibliolatry. You bow down to a paper pope.

It’s
striking that Michael would resort to that impious, underhanded tactic.

Now, let
me cease with the self-deprecation for a moment.

I don’t
see any self-deprecation in Michael’s post. Rather, I see him deprecating
Bible-believing Christians.

The
historic message of the Bible needs to take precedence over the theological
nature of the Bible. And here is where I feel we Evangelicals, in our zeal and
love for the Bible, taint the Gospel with unnecessary additives. These
additives, more often than not, create red herrings where we can end up leaving
Jesus out altogether as we defend against thousands of claims of Bible
contradictions. Further, I believe that this defense needs to be exclusively
concerned with the historicity of the resurrection of Christ (“Resurrection
Apologetics”). If Christ is risen from the grave, Christianity is true, no
matter how many contradictions one thinks they have found. And if Christ did
not rise from the grave, Christianity is false, no matter how harmonious the
Bible shows to be. In short, I don’t have to convince anyone of the inspiration
and inerrancy of Scripture in order to introduce them to my Savior. I just have
to make a case that the historicity of the story of Christ contained in the
Bible is reliable enough to warrant their belief.

i) The
“additives” that Michael excoriates are Biblical teachings. Teachings that he
himself acknowledges to be Biblical. It’s interesting to see him characterize Biblical
teachings as “additives.”

ii) An
evangelistic message needn’t be centered on the Resurrection, or even mention
the Resurrection. Typically, an evangelistic message is centered on the cross.
An evangelistic message stresses our sinfulness, and desperate need for a
Savior. Of course, we need a Risen Savior. A dead Savior won’t do. But that’s a
presupposition of an evangelistic message.

iii)
When Jesus spoke with Nicodemus (Jn 3), did he focus on the Resurrection? When
Jesus spoke with the woman at the well (Jn 4), did he focus on the
Resurrection? When Jesus spoke with the blind man (Jn 9), did he focus on the
Resurrection? When Jesus delivered the Break of Life discourse (Jn 6), did he
focus on the Resurrection?

iv) It’s
one thing to say we should emphasize the Resurrection, quite another to say we
should give both believers and unbelievers a list of optional Bible teachings.

Imagine
attending a church pastored by St. John or St. Paul where the ushers distribute
a brochure of Biblical teachings you can disbelieve and still be a “committed
servant of God.”

Can
Michael point to any place in the Gospels, Book of Acts, NT Epistles, or
Revelation, where we’re told we can disregard various teachings of Scripture?

v)
Speaking of which:

Inasmuch
as many have undertaken to compile a narrative of the things that have been
accomplished among us, 2 just as those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses
and ministers of the word have delivered them to us, 3 it seemed good to me
also, having followed all things closely for some time past, to write an
orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, 4 that you may have
certainty concerning the things you have been taught (Lk 1:1-4).

Does
Luke say it’s okay if you only believe an “essential” core of his Gospel?

30 Now
Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not
written in this book; 31 but these are written so that you may believe that
Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in
his name (Jn 20:30-31).

Does
John say it’s okay if you only believe an “essential” core of his Gospel?

Michael
likes to drape himself in the mantle of the gospel and the Resurrection, which
sounds very devout, and makes his critics look legalistic by comparison, but
notice the glaring contrast between his approach and NT Christianity.

In his post I’m going to document Michael Patton’s position
rather than evaluate his position. Patton has accused his critics
(“watchblogs”) of missing the point he was trying to make. But it looks to me
like Patton himself has muddied the waters regarding his position. Patton is
making at least two different points rather than one.

Apologetic/evangelistic methodology:

These two stories are illustrations of the importance of
keeping to the “make or break” issues of our faith when sharing the Gospel. The
issues of origins, inspiration, and inerrancy are very important. We eventually
need to discuss them. But they are not ”make or break” issues. And they can be
used to sidetrack discussions of the Gospel into endless and fruitless debate.
They can often keep you from getting to Christ. The two people above may have
never really heard an actual argument for the Gospel. They were both
intellectual types who were ready to debate so many things that did not matter.
I don’t need to convince an unbeliever that the Bible is inspired or inerrant.
The issue of evolution does not matter if it is only keeping you from sharing
the Gospel. Don’t get me wrong, sometimes people will have legitimate hang-ups
about these and other things that need to be dealt with. But sometimes we need
to deal with them by explaining that they have no bearing on whether Jesus rose
from the grave. Once we establish Christ’s resurrection, you can get back to
those things. But in our apologetics, we need to do everything we can to get to
the historicity of the resurrection.

Here Patton is talking about how to witness to unbelievers. He’s talking about how people come to the faith, how to
bring them to the faith. This is directed at outsiders.

And he’s asserting that in those situations, inspiration,
inerrancy, the historicity of Gen 1-11, are inessential.

Fallback position:

It is my argument that often – far too often – conservative
Christians become identified with issues that, while important, do not make or
break our faith. This creates extremely volatile situations (from a human
perspective) as believers’ faith ends up having a foundation which consists of
one of these non-foundational issues. When and if these issues are
significantly challenged, our faith becomes unstable. I have seen too many
people who walk away from the faith due to their trust in some non-essential
issue coming unglued.

One of
the first things that I have to teach my students this: The Christian faith is
not a house of cards.

Most
assuredly, there are foundational issues of the faith that, if taken away, will
destroy Christianity. Issues like the existence of God (there is no such thing
as a “Christian atheist”), the resurrection of Christ, the reality of God’s
judgment and grace through Jesus Christ, and Christ’s atoning death on the
cross. However, there are many details of the Christian faith that can suffer
adjustments without destroying the entire faith. Christianity is not like a
house of cards where you can take any one card away and the rest fall.

I have
seen many people leave the faith and the catalyst of their departure was a
rejection of inerrancy (the belief that the Bible does not have any errors,
historic, theological, or scientific). I have seen others leave because they
felt they had to adjust their view of the early chapters of Genesis, creation
and the flood. I have seen others who thought that if there was any redacting
(editing by the authors) of the Gospel narratives, their faith was destroyed.
Still, I have actually been in contact with one who was shaken to the point of
petrification because he was starting to consider the multiple author theory
for Isaiah. These are issues to be sure. But they are not issues which can
cause any harm to the essence of Christianity in any way.

It is
normally those who are brought up in rigidity who are susceptible building this
house of cards theology and to letting non-cardinal issues crash their faith.
This is why you see so many who are “former fundamentalists.” Fundamentalism
feeds on unnecessary rigidity and therefore, unfortunately, is quite a seedbed
for graveyards of Christians. As well, this type of thinking makes
education—true education—virtually impossible.

While I
believe strongly in many issues that are of non-cardinal value, I don’t hold on
to these too tightly. This is a fundamental philosophical precursor to dealing
with so many theological problems today. The inability to identify, isolate,
and distinguish between essentials and non-essentials often causes the entire
house of cards to fall.

Greg Jones
was an evangelical Christian, active in his church, a regular preacher, teacher
and served on the elder board. He says that he was addicted to fundamentalism. He slept, ate, and drank
the truths of Christianity. After a decade of faithful service to the church, he
is now a professing atheist who rejects the naivety of all that he held to so dearly. Why? Well, as he tells the story,
he says that he was awakened out of his slumber of fundamentalism through many encounters
with the truth. Chief among these encounters
was when he finally realized that the Bible was full of errors.

This description
is a common testimony of many who havewalked away from the faith. But this blog is not aboutwalking away from the faith per se, but with the dangers of the doctrine of inerrancy.

Before
commenting on Seely, I’d like to make a general observation. There are scholars
like Bill Arnold and Peter Enns who engage the flood account at a purely
textual level, as if this is just a story. A literary construct with no real
world correlative.

But why
think ancient people took no interest in natural disasters? Why think ancient
people didn’t have a cultural memory of natural disasters? They led precarious
lives, at the mercy of natural forces that could, and sometimes did, wipe them
out.

Take
this passage of Scripture:

The
words of Amos, who was among the shepherds of Tekoa, which he saw concerning
Israel in the days of Uzziah king of Judah and in the days of Jeroboam the son
of Joash, king of Israel, two years before the earthquake (Amos 1:1).

Amos is
using a major earthquake to date his calling. He takes for granted the fact
that his audience remembered the event. That this was an unforgettable
experience for those who lived through it.

Take St.
Lucia’s flood in 1287. Take the volcanic destruction of Pompeii and Herculaneum
in 79 AD. Take the Antioch earthquake in 115 AD. Take the Minoan eruption (c.
1600 BC), which may have inspired the legend of Atlantis.

Why
assume ancient people just invent stories about natural disasters?

Data
from various scientific disciplines provides a clear indication that Noah’s
Flood did not cover the globe of the earth.

There
are, of course, evangelical scientists who field stock objections to a global
flood. For instance:

Walt
Brown, In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence for Creation and the Flood (8th
ed.)

Jonathan
Sarfati, The Greatest Hoax on Earth?

Andrew
Snelling, Earth’s Catastrophic Past

Kurt
Wise, Faith, Form, and Time

Other
writers include Marcus Ross and Steven Austin.

Before
considering that data, however, we must first determine a rough earliest
probable date for the Flood. If the Flood is an actual historical event, it
must touch down in the empirical data of history somewhere. We can make a rough
approximation of its date from the two genealogies in Genesis 5 and 11. At one
end is Adam, whose culture is Neolithic and therefore can be dated no earlier
than around 9,000 or 10,000 B.C. At the other end is Abraham who can be dated
to approximately 2000 B.C. In both genealogies the Flood occurs in the middle
of these two ends, and therefore roughly at 5500 or 6000 B.C. An even clearer
indication of the Flood’s date is implied by the statement that shortly after
the Flood, Noah planted a vineyard. This implies the growing of domesticated
grapes, which do not show up in the archaeological record until c. 4000 B.C.1
The biblical Flood is therefore probably not earlier than 4000 or maybe 5000
B.C.

The genealogy in Gen 5 begins with Adam, who is clearly
described as a farmer in a garden (Gen 2:15) and who after his expulsion from
the garden continues to do the very same kind of work (Gen 3:23 and 2:5,15).
Genesis 4:1,2 in the light of 4:25 imply that Cain and Abel were contemporaries
of Adam. Since Adam and Cain were farmers and Abel a shepherd, and neither
domesticated crops nor domesticated sheep or goats appear in the archaeological
record until c. 9000 B.C., Adam's earliest possible date is c. 9000 B.C.'
Adam's probable date, however, appears to be later. Genesis 2:8 tells us that
God planted a garden (see 9:20; 21:33; Lev 9:23) that had fruit trees (2:9, 16;
3:2, 7). The implication of the words "plant" and "garden"
are that the fruit trees are domesticated fruit trees. Adam has to "work"
the garden (2:15), but he does not have to domesticate wild trees.

i)
Notice that his entire argument hinges on a Neolithic date for Adam. That’s the
terminus ad quo. All his subsequent arguments build on that pivotal assumption.

ii) A
Neolithic dating scheme usually assumes a chronological progression, where
human culture passes through a series of stages, viz.,

Paleolithic

Mesolithic

Neolithic

Copper
Age

Bronze
Age

Iron Age

This is
subject to further subdivisions, viz. Neolithic prepottery.

Neolithic
culture is characterized by bone and stone implements, primitive husbandry and
horticulture.

iii)
There are problems with using this classification scheme to date Adam. For one
thing, Gen 2 says precious little about Adamic technology. Moreover, nothing in
Gen 2 requires farming or the domestication of animals. The garden animals were
already tame. Moreover, the garden already had edible wild vegetation.

Indeed,
life in Eden stands in contrast to conditions outside the garden. That’s one
reason the expulsion from Eden was a physical hardship (Gen 3:17-19).

iv) In
addition, it’s my impression that many cultures subsist in a state of
technological stasis, absent some external stimulus. Cultures don’t
automatically undergo technological progress. A lot depends on the natural resources
which their particular locale provides. There’s not much incentive to develop
more technology than you need to survive or flourish. Some environments are
more hospitable than others. Life is easier in some places than others.

For
instance, Mesopotamians were motivated to develop flood control technology. But
unless you live in a flood zone, there’s not the same incentive.

Likewise,
competitive military technology can be a spur to innovation (e.g. metallurgy).
If your enemy uses spears, it behooves you to develop long bows. If your enemy
uses long bows, it behooves you to develop crossbows. If your enemy uses bronze
weaponry, it behooves you to develop iron weaponry. If your enemy uses swords,
it behooves you to develop muskets. If your enemy uses fortified cities, it
behooves you to develop cannons. And so on and so forth.

Take
North America, South America, and South Pacific Islanders before contact with
Europeans. Didn’t many “Indians” operate at a roughly Neolithic level for
centuries on end? If European colonization hadn’t jump-started their culture,
wouldn’t many of those cultures remain at a Neolithic level indefinitely?

To take
another comparison, weren’t some Mesoamerican Indian cultures (e.g. Maya, Inca,
Aztec) more “advanced” than many North American Indian tribes (e.g. Iroquois,
Plains Indians)?

The fact
that a particular culture is technologically primitive doesn’t strike me as a
reliable chronological indicator. Even in the 20C, we’ve discovered “stone age”
tribes in the Amazon jungle.

iv)
Seely also confuses technological innovation with cultural diffusion.
Technological innovation only requires a smart inventor. But technological
innovation could be quite localized. Archeological evidence assumes fairly
widespread practice. After all, given how little evidence survives the ravages
of time, there had to be a large initial sample to have trace evidence
millennia later. The first datable evidence we happen to have for a particular
custom is hardly concomitant with when the custom was first introduced. We’d
expect the custom to antedate our residual evidence.

When
tells in the Near East which date from 5000 to the time of Abraham are
examined, no evidence of a global flood is found. In fact, overlapping layers
of occupation, one on top of the other, often with the remains of mud-brick
houses in place, are found intact spanning the entire period. No matter what
specific date one might put on the flood after 5000 B.C., there were sites in
the Near East at that date where people lived and remained undisturbed by any
serious flood. In other words, not only is there no evidence of a flood that
covered the Near East, there is archaeological evidence that no flood covered
the Near East between 5000 and the time of Abraham.

In fact
there are continuous cultural sequences which overlap each other from 9500 to
3000 B.C. and down into the times of the patriarchs and later.

Let’s
grant that contention for the sake of argument. It’s only as good as his Neolithic
starting point. What if the flood took place before then?

So, there is an objective basis for an actual biblical
Flood. Why then do I title this post “Barely Local?” The answer is that neither
the flood of 2900 B.C. nor any other actual local flood, such as the Black Sea
flood, nor the melting of ice caps at various historical points closely fits
the biblical description. Local flood theories do not fit the biblical account
with regard to secondary issues such as lasting one year and destroying all the
birds (even in a local area).

The fact that all birds died in
the Flood, leaving alive only Noah and those with him on the ark (Gen 7:21-23)
makes it clear that the Flood was not local. In a local flood a small minority
of birds might die, but most of them would fly away to dry land.

i) Which assumes the birds were brought on board to preserve
them from the flood. But a local flood doesn’t require that rationale. Rather,
ravens and homing pigeons were used in ancient maritime navigation to locate
land.

ii) Keep in mind that even in a global flood, some waterfowl
could presumably survive on carrion, driftwood, &c.

More importantly, no local flood theory agrees with the
biblical account at the most critical points: landing the ark in the Ararat
mountains, covering the entire Near East (Genesis 9:19, “all the earth” =
Genesis 10),

The statement of Gen 7:19 that
water covered "all the high mountains under all the heavens"
contextually includes the high mountains under the heavens of the country of
Ararat (Gen 8:4), ancient Urartu which centered around Lake Van. Since the
country of Ararat was thought to have been located at the northern extent of
the earth (Gen 10:2; Ezek 38:6) at the "the nether end of the known
world," it is not just Mesopotamia but the entire extent of the earth as
it was then conceived that is in view.

i) Notice that Seely
distinguishes between a worldwide flood and a local flood which covers the
known world. In his opinion, the narrator is describing what is actually a
local flood, but global from the blinkered perspective of the ancient narrator.

ii) But if, by his own
admission, the flood was actually local, then what would localize the flood are
natural barriers like mountains.

iii) What about the Lake Van
area?

The “mountains of Ararat” of
8:4 most likely refers to the foothills where the Mesopotamian plains in the
north yield to the highlands near the sources of the Tigris and Euphrates
rivers. B. Arnold, Genesis (Cambridge 2009), 105.

The plateaus around the lakes
are about 1.6 km. (1 mi.) above sea level, surrounded by even higher mountains.
“Urartu,” The New International Dictionary of Biblical Archaeology, 463.

According to Seely’s own
depiction, the land of Ararat marks the outer limits of the flood. And what,
exactly, would prevent the floodwaters from extending beyond that region?
Presumably the mountain range.

So the mental picture this
generates is rising water submerging the plateaus or foothills, but contained
by the mountain range behind it. Like water in a saucer. That would be
consistent with the landmarks that Seely educes.

In addition, although the ark
is said to come to rest on the "mountains" (plural) of Ararat rather
than on a particular peak like Mt. Ararat, Gen 8:3-5 implies that the ark
landed very high up in the Ararat mountains, because after the ark grounded the
water had to recede for another two and a half months before the tops of the
surrounding mountains became exposed. It is perhaps possible that the ark did
not land on what is now called Mt. Ararat, but it must have landed on some
higher-than-average mountain in Urartu or else the tops of the surrounding
mountains would have been exposed much sooner. Genesis 8:3-5 thus implies that
the water was even deeper than 8000 feet.

It’s not clear to me how Seely
is visualizing this process.

i) Seems to me that where the
ark ran aground would depend on whatever the ark happened to be floating above
at the time floodwaters were receding. From what I’ve read, the land of Ararat
is a hilly region with many narrow valleys. So, for instance, the ark might be
caught in the eddy of a steep mountain cove. The walls of the cove would ring
the ark, like a toy boat in a bathtub after you pull the plug. The elevation
would vary, depending on the location of the cove.

ii) If the ark came to rest in
a steep mountain cove, Noah wouldn’t be able to see above or around the
surrounding hillsides. Indeed, that would be a good reason to release the raven
and the homing pigeon.

That the Bible is describing
the Flood as covering the entire earth as it was then conceived is perhaps most
conclusively seen in the fact that the primeval ocean of Gen 1:2, half of which
was placed above the firmament on the second day of creation (Gen 1:6, 7) and
half of which was placed around and under the earth on the third day of
creation (Gen 1:9, 10; Job 26:10; Pss 24:2; 136:6; Prov 8:27b) comes back from
above the firmament and from below the earth (Gen 7:11; cf. 8:2) to again cover
the earth with water."

Of course, the flood is not a
literal de-creation. It is analogous to creation in reverse.

Given the probable date of the
Flood, we can also ask the question. Is there any archaeological evidence for a
Flood in the Near East between 4000 (or 5000 at the earliest) and 2300 B.C.?
The short answer is that the only evidence of serious flooding in the Near East
during that time period is from riverine floods.

And since the biblical account
is describing a flood much more extensive than that, we have no archaeological
evidence for the Flood as it is described in Scripture.

In addition, since even local
riverine floods normally leave some evidence by way of silt layers, a year-long
flood (Gen 7:11; 8:13-14) covering all the high mountains (Gen 7:19) from
around Sardinia to Afghanistan and from the Black Sea to the Gulf of Aden (Gen
9:19; 10:32) would certainly have left physical evidence in the tells of the
Near East. These tells should all show a silt layer or at least a sterile layer
dating to the same time period throughout the Near East.

The walls of mud brick
buildings, which are found on most sites, should show serious water erosion,
and this erosion should appear at the same time period throughout the Near
East. Also, if the Flood destroyed all but eight people, most of these tells
should show a long period of vacancy following their silt or sterile layer,
while the population regrew and expanded.

i) This objection piggybacks on
Seely’s dubious timeframe.

ii) Also, although I’m no
expert, I don’t see why we’d expect evidence for an ancient flood to be
coextensive with the scope of the flood. Wouldn’t the evidence tend to be intermittent,
even if the flood was more widespread? Depending on local terrain and
precipitation, spring melt, wouldn’t some silt layers be washed away? Wouldn’t
subsequent water erosion erode some of the flood deposit?

From these passages in Ezekiel,
Gen 49:25, and Deut 33:13 along with ancient Near Eastern parallels, OT
biblical scholars, including the consensus of evangelical OT scholars, agree
that the "fountains of the great Deep" which supplied the water for the
Flood were fresh water terrestrial fountains drawing upon a subterranean sea.

Ground water and soil moisture,
which would be the modernized counterpart to the subterranean ocean that
supplied the water for the tree in Ezek 31, the agricultural crops in Gen 49
and Deut 33, and the terrestrial fountains of Gen 7:11, constitute just 0.615
percent of all water on earth. If 100 percent of it flowed out upon the earth,
it would flood the earth to a depth of less than 60 feet. It is obvious then
that if they are transmuted into modern terms, the "fountains of the great
Deep" are completely inadequate to cover all the high mountains of even
the Near East.

Let’s grant that contention for the sake
of argument. If, according to Seely’s own analysis, the narrative doesn’t identify
adequate water reserves to flood the whole world or even the entire ANE, then,
on internal grounds, why is that not an argument for a local flood from the
viewpoint of the narrator?

Most telling is the fact that Noah is treated in Gen 9 as a
new Adam, a new beginning for mankind.

But that would be consistent
with a local flood that’s anthropologically universal. And some of the
narrative landmarks dovetail with that particular outlook.

Gen 2:10-14 situates Eden
somewhere in Mesopotamia. So that would be the epicenter of human population.
Man would migrate from that focal point.

And the ark lands in northern
Mesopotamia (Gen 8:4). That would be consistent with a flood that originates in
Mesopotamia. The diluvial point of origin would correspond to the human point
of origin. The scope of the flood would correspond to the biogeography of human
dispersion at that stage of human history, where man radiates out from Eden,
but is still confined to the ANE–which would also be consistent with the Table of
Nations (Gen 10).

I conclude that Seely’s
objections to the local flood interpretation are fallacious. Moreover, he
doesn’t engage the most astute proponents of the global flood interpretation.
So his argument fails on both counts.